They rented ten acres of poor, stony land and launced into chicken raising.

I discovered that one of the stories in Sherwood Anderson's short story collection, “The Triumph of the Egg” was written about my father.

Not really, but it was almost uncanny in its resemblance to my dad and his experience with chicken raising in the 1940’s. (My father even owned a restaurant like the main character in the short story.)

Father was no more successful than Anderson's protagonist, and my father suffered from the same painful feelings of insecurity and in spite of his best efforts, he was not ‘good enough’ to be a success at anything he tried.

And when success continued to elude him, he resigned himself to his lot in life and no longer dreamed of a better life for himself or his family.

I had to write a play inspired by Sherwood Anderson's short story,”The Triumph of the Egg” ; I’d sneak my father in the literary ‘back door’ and make it his story as well.

Although my mother was not a school teacher like the woman in Anderson's story, she was a lot like my mother. It could be said that she was 'a lot' like many of the women in the 1940’s where one’s husband came first-no matter what hairbrained ideas he might have at any given moment. (Women couldn't afford wild ideas, they had to think of their children's welfare first.)

Play: The Egg: A TragedyTime: Late Thirties

Scene opens with HOLDEN KETTERING in chicken yard. (Stage Center) Holden is seventeen. Holden is dressed in overalls, straw hat on head. He carries bag of chicken feed. HoldenMy father, by nature a cheerful, kindly man worked as a farm hand up to the time he was 34 years old.

On Saturday evenings he drove into town, drank several glasses of beer and visited with farm hands. At ten o’clock he drove horse, and himself home.. He was quite happy with his position in life.

My father had no notion of trying to rise in the world. My father by nature…

(Violet walks over and to book case and begins to put them in) HoldenFather liked to sing songs, tell jokes. He had no notion of trying to rise…..

Violet (Interrupts) Your father wasn’t happy. He was just waiting for a purpose in life. I gave him that.

Holden At thirty-four, he married my mother, a country school teacher.

Violet He was thirty-five years old when you came into the world. It was spring, A time of growth and promise.

Holden Father had no notion of trying to rise in the world. But after I was born, something happened to my parents.They became ambitious.

VIOLETDelivered of you, I became large with plans and dreams.You would rule over men some day. Your father would rise from poverty to greatness like Abraham Lincoln.

Violet opens book.

"From log cabin to White House."

HOLDEN The American passion for getting up the world took possession of them.

For the first time Holden acknowledges his mother. HE TURNS TOWARD HER.

Holden Mother put down that book! It smells of chicken feathers.

Violet continues to leaf through the pages.

My mother induced father to give up his place as a farm hand, sell his horse and embark on an independent enterprise of his own.

Violet puts book back in case.

Violet Frederick, come in here. I want to discuss something with you.

Holden They rented ten acres of poor, stony land and launched into chicken raising.

FREDERICK ENTERS. His is around 45, and is balding. He is a little pudgy.

Frederick What is it, Vi?

Holden I, on the other hand, am a gloomy man inclined to see the darker side of life.

Violet Where’s Holden?

Frederick Out in the chicken yard.

HoldenI attribute it to the fact that what should have been joyous days of childhood was spent on a chicken farm.

FrederickStrange boy, that one.

VioletWhat do you mean?

FrederickHe was sitting down on a tree stump in the chicken yard staring down one of the hens. Violet It’s the heat. It hasn’t rained in a week. It’s make anyone ‘strange.’

Frederick slumps down in SOFA.

FREDERICKI’m discouraged, Vi. We’ve had the chicken farm for about ten years and I’m more in debt now than I’ve even been in my life.

HOLDENI think most philosophers must have been raised on chicken farms. FrederickI made more money as a hired farm hand! HoldenConsider if you will all the many and tragic things than can happen to a chicken.It’s born out of an egg, lives for a few weeks as a tiny fluffy thing such as you see pictured on Easter cards. It then becomes hideously naked. It eats quantities of corn and meal, it gets a disease called Pip, cholera, and it stands looking with stupid eyes at the sun.

Becomes sick and dies.

FrederickEvery cent I can scrape together goes for some cure for chicken diseases.Wilmer’s White Wonder Cholera Cure worked wonders for keeping the mosquitoes away. It didn’t do much for the Cholera.

VioletI’ve been thinking of a plan.

HoldenA few hens, now and then a rooster, intended to serve God’s mysterious ends, may struggle through to maturity.

VioletWe won’t let this gets us down, Frederick. The only failure is giving up.

HoldenThe hens lay eggs out of which come other chickens and the dreadful cycle is made complete.

FrederickI’m nearly forty-five years old, Vi. Too old to start over.

VioletI won’t listen to that! You’ve got your best years ahead of you. We’ll just have to put our thinking caps on and come up with something else.

Violet begins to pull different books from the shelf.

VioletLet’s see, how can we use the raising of chickens for experience to get into another line of work? HoldenSmall chickens just setting out on the journey of life look so bright and alert and they are in fact dreadfully stupid.

Frederick looks toward Violet.

Frederick (Sighs)I wish you wouldn’t consult your books Vi. The last time you did that I got into the chicken business. VioletI don’t understand where we went wrong, Frederick. Raising Chickens for More Than Chicken Feed assured us that fortunes could be made out of poultry farms.

HoldenChickens are so much like people they mix one up in one’s judgment of life.

Violet put the book back, pulls out another.

Violet What can we do with all the eggs the hens lay?

Frederick Make a giant-size omelet? We could feed all of Bidwell.

Holden Most philosophers have been raised on chicken farms.

Violet Frederick, that’s it!

Frederick I’m not buying any more chickens, Vi.

Violet We’ll go into the restaurant business!

Holden Oh, no! She’s hatched another of her plans. Restaurant business. What do I know about the restaurant business?

VioletWhat is there to know? People have to eat. I can cook. You yourself said my blueberry pie could be world famous.

FrederickI don’t know…

Holden You need only two of the twenty-six letters of the English Alphabet To answer her father.

Frederick It’s risky, Vi. It’ll take time to find a suitable place we can afford to buy.

Holden The fourteenth and fifteen letter. They’re next to each other for God’s sakes!

Violet There’s an empty store building opposite the railroad station in Bidwell. I discovered it when our last batch of chickens failed to incubate and I checked into it. We can get it for a song, Frederick.

FrederickWhen I think about it, it just may not be a bad idea. We would just feature short orders, no big menu items and with your famous pies…people would be sure to come.

FREDERICK GET UP AND GOES OVER TO TOP OF BOOKSHELF. He takes down glass jar with a deformed chicken in it. He holds it (almost lovingly) I his arms.

And then they’re always my Grotesques.

Holden (Weakly)Not those, Father.

FrederickI’ve always suspected that people would be interested in them.

VioletFrederick you know how I hate those things!

FrederickThe grotesques are valuable. People like to look at strangeAnd wonderful things.

VioletNot In a restaurant!

LIGHTS DIM ON VIOLET AND FREDERICK.

HoldenLet me tell you a little about father’s grotesques. On a chicken farm where hundreds of chicken come out of eggs, surprising things sometimes happen. Grotesques are born out of eggs and out of people.

It doesn’t happen often, perhaps once in a thousand births.A chicken is born that has four legs, two pairs of wings, two heads or what not.

The things do not live.

The fact that the poor little things could not live was one of the tragediesof life to father. He saved all the little monstrous things that had been born on our chicken farm. They were preserved in alcohol and put in its ownglass bottle.

Violet (To Holden) This is our big chance Holden. I feel it in my bones. It’ll be hard work, but we’re used to that.

We’ve got a new president now and he’s assured us that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

Holden Franklin Delano Roosevelt was not raised on a chicken farm.

Violet We’re down, but we’re not licked. I believe in our American System, Holden.

Success is for anyone who wants it badly enough. Our Restaurant is going to make money because your father and I will not accept failure!

Holden A restaurant, Mother. It will be too much work. At your-----

Violet It’ll take about a month to get in shape. I saw that there were rooms Upstairs that can be converted into living space for boarders.

Holden ….time of life.

Violet There’s the passenger train that’ll bring in customers. The Travelers will be tired and want something to eat and a place to sleep. Who knows we might even be able to sell them an egg or two.

Holden I don’t ever want to see an egg again.

Violet You’re far too pessimistic, Holden. You’ve got to see the bright side of life.

Holden (Looks toward father) Look at him, Mother. Cradling those…grotesques as if they were something alive and precious.

Violet When we open the restaurant he’ll forget them Holden. He’ll have other things to fill up his mind. Just you wait and see. Holden He’ll not forget Mother. He’s preserved them in alcohol.

"It was an egg that reduced my father to a trembling, weeping boy."

LIGHTS UP ON RESTAURANT AREA CENTER STAGE. A small radio on a shelf is playing “Boo-Hoo” (Boo-Hoo Edward Heyman, Carment Lombardo and John Jacob Loeb, c. 1936)

HoldenTrue to mother’s words, we opened in a month. He did all the work himself, put in shelves of canned vegetables, and dry goods. When the work was done, he painted a sign on which he put his name in large red letters.

Below his name was the sharp command, “Eat Here”.

It was seldom obeyed. We were getting some customer’s but not enough to cover expenses.If father just hadn’t gotten an idea to get up in the world!

LIGHTS DIM ON RESTAURANT AND COME UP ON LIVING AREA.Frederick and VIOLET are seated on couch drinking coffee.

Frederick I’ve finally figured out why I can’t make the restaurant pay.

Violet It takes time, Frederick. Our trade is beginning to build. Only Yesterday I sold six blueberry pies.

Frederick The place isn’t fun!

Violet I beg your pardon?

Frederick I’m too serious. To really get ahead in the world a person’s got to be cheerful.

Violet You’re taciturn by nature, Frederick.

Frederick My nature isn’t imprinted on me like a Zebra’s stripes! I’ll become jolly if it kills me! There’s nothing to Vi. I’ve just got to smile when I don’t feel like it. Do it enough times and it’ll begin to feel natural.

I’ll entertain my customers; tell stories---maybe show them a trick or two.

Frederick freezes in posture suggestive of a Magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat. Lights UP back on restaurant.

Holden begins to swab counter.

HoldenFor two weeks this notion of the Jolly Innkeeper invaded our house. Mother smiled at the boarders, and I, catching the infection, smiled at the cat.

We smiled a lot before something happened that forever ruined father’s plans to become a successful restaurateur/entertainer.

Holden walks over to end of counter where there’s a basket of eggs.

It was an egg that reduced my father to a trembling, weeping boy at My mother’s knee. An egg.

Holden picks up an egg and turns it over in his hands. The thin-shelled ovum of a bird.

Holden puts egg back in basket. LIGHTS DIM AND VI AND FREDERICK BECOME ANIMINATED.

Frederick I’m going to start tonight, Vi. I feel reborn---fresh out of my shell. They’ll be young people waiting for the train and I’ll show them what I can do.Frederick gets up and goes to door.

Frederick (Ala George Burns) “Say goodnight, Gracie.”

Violet “Say goodnight, Gracie.”

LIGHTS GO DOWN AND THEN UP ON RESTAURANT. JOE RHODES A YOUNG MERCHANT FROM BIDWELL IS SEATED AT COUNTER DRINKINGA CUP OF COFFEE.

FREDERICK ENTERS THE RESTAURANT. He sees RHODES, and becomes frozen in fright. Frederick is suffering from stage fright.

"What could be keeping that train?"

Frederick rubs the egg too hard. It breaks. He doesn’t seem to notice. He takes another egg out of the basket and begins to rub it.Rhodes picks up paper. He’s lost all interest..

Frederick I did it once. I can do it again! It’s the heat of the body and the gentle rolling of the egg back and forth.

Are you watching?

Rhodes puts down paper. A deep sigh.

Rhodes Yes.

When Frederick thinks the egg is right he gently tries to balance it on one end. The egg falls over.

Rhodes Pshaw! You’ve given new meaning to the showman’s term “to lay an egg.”

FrederickI tell you I had it standing on end! Why can’t anything happen when it’s supposed to? If you had just been looking at the right time, you would have seen it.

Everything in this world----the universe depends on timing. My wife, Violetis a school teacher and she always tells me that great men are great because they were born at the right time in history.

It’s the timing. Being born at the right time.

Abraham Lincoln was born in a log cabin in a place called Stinking Spring Farm and look what happened to him.

Rhodes He was shot.

FrederickHe was president at the right time in history. It’s all in the timing.Rhodes looks at watch.

Rhodes Speaking of time. What could be keeping that train? I’m to meet my father. He’s coming in from Mineral Springs.

Frederick claps his hands together.

Frederick Well what else can I show you?

Rhodes Nothing! Please, I’ve seen enough.

Frederick reaches under counter and takes out two jars of GROTESQUES. Heputs these in front of Cane.

Frederick Say look at this. Vi made me put them out of sight.

How would you like to have seven legs and two heads like this little fellow. Or this one---came into this world with two pairs of wings.

Rhodes I agree with your wife. Those things have no place in a restaurant!

Frederick You don’t find them interesting?

Rhodes Not in here, for God’s sakes!

Rhodes starts to get off the stool.

I need some fresh air. I going outside to wait for father.

Frederick quickly come out from behind the counter and grabs his arm. He ‘sits’ him back down.

Frederick No, sit down! Here let me freshen your coffee. And I’ll even get You in a cigar. On the house.

Frederick I’ll just put these things away. The timing is wrong.

Frederick laughs----he’s is a little out of control.

Frederick puts grotesques behind the counter. He pours Rhodes coffee and gets a cigar from the case. Rhodes smells the cigar, and then puts it in his pocket.

Rhodes That’s rightly neighborly of you. Thank you.

Frederick takes out a pan, fills it with vinegar and then takes jug from beneath the counter and puts it in front of Rhodes.

Frederick And now for your entertainment, I’m about to perform another trick.

Rhodes Please don’t bother, Mr. Kettering. I’m all tricked out.

Frederick This is one you’ll be glad you saw.

Frederick around and turns on HOT PLATE.

I’ll heat this egg in this pan of vinegar, then put it through the neck of a bottle without breaking the shell.

Rhodes Any moment now---the train….

Frederick When the egg is inside the bottle it’ll resume its normal shape and the shell will become hard again. Rhodes Maybe it jumped the tracks.

FrederickWhen I’m done I’ll give you the bottle with the egg in it. People will want to know how the egg got in the bottle.

But don’t tell them! Keep them guessing. That’s the way to have fun with the trick.

Frederick takes out the egg and attempts to put it through the neck of the bottle.

Looks like I jumped the gun. The water wasn’t hot enough.

Rhodes I’ll take your word Mr. Kettering. I know the trick will work because you say it will.

Frederick Ha, there. It might be hot enough.

Frederick takes the egg out of the water. He burns his finger.

FREDERICK Dam it!

TRAIN WHISTLES SOUNDS IN THE DISTANCE.

Rhodes I hear the train! The train. The blessed train!

Frederick is now in state of panic.

Frederick Wait! Just a moment more. The shell has to be soft, just soft enough to get through the neck of the bottle.

Frederick tries to force egg through neck of jug.

Almost got it.

Frederick is sweating now. He pushes and the egg BREAKS.

Rhodes You’ve got quite a mess there Mr. Kettering.

Rhodes get off the stool and heads for the door. He looks back at Frederick who is now just staring in space. He is a broken man.

I’ve got to go. Thanks for…...the show.

Rhodes exits hurriedly. FREDERICK PUT HIS HAND UP TO PROTEST, HE SEES THAT IT IS HOPELESS, AND HIS HAND DROPS WOODENLY TO HIS SIDE. HE IS IN DESPAIR.

LIGHTS UP ON CHICKEN YARD AS IN PLAY OPENING. HOLDEN IS SEATED ON THE LOG. HoldenAfter that, father was a broken man. He sold the restaurant. He never raised another chicken, or ate another egg.

He returned to his tactiturn nature and lived out his remaining years taking odd jobs, talking to his neighbors, and occasionally going into town for his glasses of ale and visiting with the farm hands.

It was as if he was trying to force all his hopes and dreams inside the neck of a bottle and when they didn’t fit he lost his will to succeed.

OFF STAGE Violet's Voice (Soft laughter)There goes my literary son with his literary similes. Your father was donein by an egg, Holden.